Highlights
Federal Reserve's assets totaled $4.142 trillion in the November 7 week, up $2.2 billion from the prior week and down $318.5 billion from the beginning of balance sheet unwinding in October 2017.

Treasury holdings were $2.270 trillion in the November 7 week, up very slightly in the week and down $195.0 billion since October last year. Treasuries are scheduled to decline to $2.225 trillion by the end of November.

The unwinding of mortgage-backed securities has been much slower than Treasuries and the Fed's MBS holdings were unchanged in the week at $1.669 trillion and are down $99.2 billion since October last year. MBS holdings are scheduled to decline to $1.608 trillion by the end of this month. Note that mortgage-backed unwinding can be uneven due to unscheduled prepayments of principal as well as timing differences in payments and settlements.

The largest factor adding reserves in the week was other assets, up $2.4 billion.

Reserve Bank credit for the November 7 week decreased $19.2 billion after decreasing $15.3 billion in the prior week.

Definition
The Fed's balance sheet is a weekly report presenting a consolidated balance sheet for all 12 Reserve Banks that lists factors supplying reserves into the banking system and factors absorbing reserves from the system. The report is officially named Factors Affecting Reserve Balances, otherwise known as the "H.4.1" report.

In September 2017, the Fed announced a program to reduce its balance sheet by the gradual reduction of both its Treasury and mortgage-backed security holdings. The monthly reductions, executed by reinvesting a decreasing amount of maturing securities, began in October 2017 and will gradually increase in size before hitting a plateau in October 2018 where they will hold until the FOMC judges that the Fed is holding no more securities than necessary. Under the schedule for 2018, the Fed's Treasury holdings will be reduced by $270 billion while holdings of mortgage-backed securities will be reduced by $180 billion.
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